ESCUINTLA, Guatemala (AP) – Lilian Hernandez wept as she spoke the names of aunts, uncles, cousins, her grandmother and two great-grandchildren – 36 family members in all – missing and presumed dead in the explosion of Guatemala’s Volcano of Fire.
“My cousins Ingrid, Yomira, Paola, Jennifer, Michael, Andrea and Silvia, who was just 2-years-old,” the distraught woman said – a litany that brought into sharp relief the scope of a disaster for which the final death toll is far from clear.
In this image taken with a long exposure, the Volcan de Fuego, or Volcano of Fire, spews molten rock from its crater in Alotenango, Guatemala, Sunday, June 3, 2018. Rescuers struggled to reach rural residents cut off by the deadly volcanic eruption Sunday. (AP Photo/Luis Soto)What was once a collection of verdant canyons, hillsides and farms resembled a moonscape of ash, rock and debris on Tuesday in the aftermath of the fast-moving avalanche of super-heated muck that roared into the tightly knit villages on the mountain’s flanks, devastating entire families.
Two days after the eruption, the terrain was still too hot in many places for rescue crews to search for bodies or – increasingly unlikely with each passing day – survivors.
By afternoon a new column of smoke was rising from the mountain and Guatemala’s disaster agency said volcanic material was descending its south side, prompting an evacuation order and the closure of a nearby national highway. Rescuers, police and journalists hurried to leave the area as a siren wailed and loudspeakers blared, “Evacuate!”